A good breakfast starts the night before

It’s 7:20 in the morning, your child is getting dressed like crazy and the school bus is about to turn your corner. Your child rushes out the door and forgets the one thing that will save him that day - BREAKFAST.

Everyday, parents and school kids struggle with the habit of eating breakfast. There just isn’t time and the child’s appetite hasn’t kicked in that early. And yet, breakfast, WE ALL KNOW, is the one meal of the day that will get our children fueled up for school.

Anyone going without food for more than 12 hours (since their last meal the night before) is bound to make one tired, restless and irritable. Morning meals boosts our metabolism and helps convert food into fuel for the body. So chronically skipping breakfast creates a spiral effect of a slowed down metabolism, intense hunger pangs by midmorning, snacking high-calorie less nutritional foods, which don’t get burned as quickly because of the slowed metabolism.

In fact, breakfast keeps weight in check, as a five-year study among adolescents found -  breakfast eaters tended to have lesser gain weight that breakfast skippers. 

So how do you get your kids to eat breakfast in the 10 minutes you have before the bus comes?

• prepare as much as you can the night before (gets dishes and utensils ready, cut up fruit, etc.)
• get everyone up 10 minutes earlier
• let kids help plan and prepare breakfast
• get into the habit, even on weekends and holidays
• have grab-and-go alternatives (fresh fruit, individual boxes of cereal, yogurt or smoothies, trail-mix) on days when there is little or no time to eat
• stock your kitchen with healthy breakfast options

So you check your pantry and freezer, and what do you have? Toaster pastries and breakfast bars.

Not all breakfast food are created equal. What to serve for breakfast is as equally important as the habit itself. So skip the toaster pastries that are loaded with sugar. Instead make sure your child has a balance of brain foods - carbohydrates, proteins and fibers.

Here are some great ideas for a healthy breakfast to try:

• whole-grain cereal topped with fruit and a cup of yogurt
• whole-grain waffles topped with peanut butter, fruit, or ricotta cheese
• whole-wheat pita stuffed with sliced hard-cooked eggs
• hot cereal topped with cinnamon, nutmeg, allspice, or cloves
• peanut butter on a bagel with fresh fruit (banana or apple wedges) and low-fat milk
• breakfast smoothie (milk, fruit, and teaspoon of bran, whirled in a blender)
• vegetable omelet with a bran muffin and orange juice
• bran muffin and yogurt with berries
• hummus on whole-wheat toast and milk
• lean turkey on a toasted English muffin and vegetable juice
• heated leftover rice with chopped apples, nuts, and cinnamon, plus fruit juice
• cream cheese and fresh fruit, such as sliced strawberries, on a bread or a bagel
• shredded cheese on a whole-wheat tortilla, folded in half and microwaved for 20 seconds and topped with salsa

So, tomorrow morning… let’s serve our children healthy breakfasts. They will thank us for it.